


Falling Stars

by blueangel



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-07
Updated: 2013-03-07
Packaged: 2017-12-04 14:46:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/711909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueangel/pseuds/blueangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fallen and reborn are her words. So she shall fall- fall long and hard into the stormy sea (or so they shall say), and be reborn as Septa Lemore- if only in the service of a friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling Stars

**Author's Note:**

> Hey I actually wrote a story where Jon isn't a Targaryen

It is a curious thing to have one son taken from her only to have another placed in her arms. To see amethyst eyes where there was once gray. Ashara takes it in stride though; even as her heart aches for the loss of a brother-even as it clenches at the thought of her lover and son riding to the North, she stands resolute.

Fallen and reborn are her words. So she shall fall- fall long and hard into the stormy sea (or so they shall say), and be reborn as Septa Lemore- if only in the service of a friend.

* * *

 

Ashara watches Aegon grow.

It’s her breast he sucks from, and it’s her who comforts him when he cries: wiping his tears with her Septa’s robes and kissing him on the nose over and over again until he giggles. He is a sweet boy, and more than once Ashara thinks about abandoning Connigton and the company. She knows that Jon thinks of Aegon as Rhaegar come again- she knows how much he loved the Prince, but he did so blindly.

Oh, Ashara knows that Rhaegar would have been a better king than Aerys, who wouldn’t be? Rhaegar was beautiful and could play songs that could make maids weep, but he had a spark of madness in him that would not be doused.

It is for that reason that Ashara does not want Aegon to be Rhaegar’s son. If he is take after someone then let him take after Elia: sweet and gentle Elia, who only loved too well, but was not blind when it came to Rhaegar. She was Ashara’s dearest friend and that was why she held the hand of a light- haired violet- eyed boy, instead of a babe with dark eyes and dark hair.

Because no matter what, Aegon was not her son, and no matter how much she tried she could not banish the image of Ned holding Jon.

* * *

 

The years pass, and inch by inch they grow closer to Westeros, and it seems as if the closer they grow the more she dreads it Aegon promises her silks and jewels and perfumes. Promises her power and respect, as befitting her station, and she takes in his words with a hollow smile - she more than anyone, knows how much words mean in times of war, even from the most honorable of men.   

Aegon is being kind- to think of her It gives her hope that his gentle nature has not all been carved out by Jon Connigton. More than once she has argued with him. More than once she has pointed out that Aegon need not be taught to be so unforgiving; that kings could be merciful and still rule well, but Jon’s gaze is always hard- he has seen war and what it has cost him- but she has seen cruelty and madness, and that is what has truly had cost them _everything_.

* * *

 

Jon Connigton meets his end in the Stormlands, a fitting death even if it is not at the point of a sword, rather a disease. Still, the once- hand of the king smiles as the bells toll and he takes his last breath.

Ashara does not weep for him, she has wept enough: for her brother, her lover, her Princess, and her Queen-she has no tears left to spare. Besides, this is war, and there is no room for tears in war. She says as much to Aegon, whose shoulders shake even as he cries silently.

In the end she is the one that stays Aegon’s hand when he whispers of fire and blood and vengeance. Winter is cruel enough, she tells him. He is a boy no longer though. He is a man forged by circumstance and tempered by blood.  

* * *

 

They sweep across the land, joined by the Martells, but it is folly, because the dragons and their mother come, and Ashara is certain that she shall not be lenient to a nephew that calls himself a king and a conqueror: it is whispered that she showed no mercy to her brother.

It is she that bows to the Dragon Queen and pleads for Elia’s son. It is she that speaks of a son who was lost and begs the Queen- that she does not the heart to bear another loss; all the while Aegon is locked beneath Dragonstone in chains, his once loyal Company now bowing to another. There is something akin to sympathy in the Daenerys Targaryen’s eyes, and both she and Aegon are spared.

She sees the anger in Aegon’s eyes, but she digs her nails into his arm and quietly reminds him that his time shall come, when winter is done, and Daenerys and is gone.

Dragon fire is a persuasive thing, and so Daenerys and her army burn what they can, all the while rumors from the North come on the wind and Ashara learns that she has truly lost her son.

* * *

 

At the end there is victory; a hollow one at that. When winter finally breaks a girl with Tully hair and Tully eyes rules the North and Daenerys rules with her dragons upon the Iron Throne and Lannister blood runs freely, from Dorne to Winterfell.

At the end she stands next to her nephew, Edric, who might as well be Arthur reborn, and watches as Aegon is burned on a pyre with a Red Priestess proclaiming him The Prince who was Promised.

Ashara wanders Westeros, feeling lost and hollow, but it Ned’s girl that invites her to stay; a smile upon her face but sadness in her eyes. She knows loss too well. So the once Lady of Starfall makes a place in Winterfell-hearing tales from Wildings and Lords alike, of Jon Snow and Ned Stark. The irony is not lost on her. Still, there is a sort of peace in the cold lands where her son grew up, and where his wolf continues to roam, and so everyday Ashara kneels before a Weirwoord tree and waits to join her son and his gods. She waits to join Ned.

She waits for absolution.


End file.
